1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to an electronic commerce shopping service system and, more particularly, to a system and method for providing a multi-merchant electronic shopping cart for a shopping service.
2. Description of the Background Art
It is often desirable for a consumer to be able to purchase a product via an electronic commerce shopping service. By using an electronic commerce shopping service, not only is the consumer able to “visit” multiple unrelated merchant shopping sites without the time and expense of commuting, but also the shopping service is able to recommend merchant shopping sites to the consumer thus increasing consumer confidence and to provide a global reward system that can encompass many merchant shopping sites. Currently, in order for a consumer to use a shopping service, he or she must initiate the purchase process though a specific shopping service website. It would be desirable to have an electronic shopping cart for a shopping service that can be used at multiple merchant shopping sites and can be easily accessed while browsing the merchant website without having to navigate to another website. It would also be desirable to be able to save multiple products from various merchants to the electronic shopping cart and be able to purchase all of the products at one time.